EDITOR'S NOTE: The Swnews4u.com Athlete of the Week is a web-only feature that will publish each Thursday or Friday throughout the calendar year.
By Jason Nihles, The Platteville Journal, Fennimore Times, Boscobel Dial
Megan Kreul, Sr., Lancaster girls track and field
LA CROSSE — For Lancaster senior Megan Kreul, the fourth time was the charm, as she brought home a coveted gold medal from this year’s WIAA State Track & Field Championships as the winner of the division 2 girls triple jump competition. For Kreul, it was her fourth trip to the state meet, where she was looking to better last year’s second-place finish in the event.
As a freshman, Kreul placed 10th in the D3 triple jump field with a leap of 33’10.5”. As a sophomore she was third at the D3 state meet with a distance of 37’0.75”, and last year as a junior was second at 37’1.75”.
This year she made it to the top of the podium with a leap of 37’5.5”, jumping nearly four inches further than the second-place finisher from Edgewood.
“I was so excited once I found out I had won,” said Kreul, grasping at her state medal hanging around her neck. “I was confident coming in that I could do well, but you never know what can happen. I felt good coming into today and I was pretty relaxed. I can get pretty worked up sometimes, but coach (Jordon) Rolland is really good at calming me down and reassuring me that I’ve got this."
Kreul also competed in the D2 girls long jump on Saturday, where she placed third with a leap of 17’11.75”, bettering her sectional jump of 17’4”.
“Megan was something special at state this year,” said Lancaster coach Kyle Stiklestad. “She was focused and determined to win. It has been a goal of hers to be the state champion in triple jump for three years. She is deserving of this honor because of the hard work and time she has put into the sport. It was an emotional moment when she won and it started off our weekend with an emotional high right away on Friday morning.”
Blake Thiry, Sr., Prairie du Chien boys track and field
LA CROSSE — The 2025 WIAA State Track Meet will go down as one of the greatest weekends in the history of Prairie du Chien High School Athletics. Senior Blake Thiry won Division 2 individual state titles in the boys long jump, triple jump and 110-meter high hurdles last Friday and Saturday at UW–La Crosse. He also place second in the 300-meter intermediate hurdles, and it took a new D2 state record to deny Thiry a fourth gold medal.
Thiry entered the weekend as a strong favorite to claim multiple gold medals as he looked to earn his first career state championship in track after numerous close calls over the previous three seasons.
First up for Thiry was a Long Jump last Friday. Also competing in the event was fellow senior and defending D2 state champion Amare Jackson of Milwaukee Academy of Science. Jackson was looking to defend his crown that he had won the year before with a jump of 23-03.50. On his final attempt of the finals, Thiry busted out a spectacular jump of 23'6.75", extending his lead and yet again breaking his own school record. Jackson admirably took his final attempt despite an obviously still sore hamstring but scratched in the final jump attempt of the finals, making Thiry the brand new D2 State Champion in the Long Jump. The championship was the Hawks first by a PdC Boy since 1979, when Bruce Hemmer won the Class B Discus.
Thiry rounded out his Friday schedule with the preliminary races in the 110 and 300 Hurdles Races. He claimed first place in both of his two heats, winning the 110 meters race in a time of 14.47 and the 300 meters race in a time of 38.48.
The final day of Thiry’s prep career began Saturday morning with the triple jump. Thiry opened up the event with a jump of 42'8.2", which put him in first place. Each of his next five jumps increased his lead which kept him in first place but it was his sixth and final jump that cemented his third state championship of the weekend when he broke his school record with a jump of 47’0".
During his triple jump attempts, Thiry ran in the finals race for the 110-meter high hurdles and earned his second state championship by winning the race in a time of 14.16, once again breaking his own school record.
With three championships won in three events entering his fourth and final event, Thiry looked to become just the third boy in the 129 year history of the WIAA State Track Meet to win four or more events at one state meet. The two boys to accomplish this feat were Alvin Kraenzlein of Milwaukee East in 1895 (100-yard-dash, 120-yard hurdles, 220-yard hurdles, broad jump and shot put) and Stratford’s Andrew Rock (D3 110 hurdles, 300 hurdles, 200 and long jump).
For the sixth time this weekend, Thiry broke his own school record in an event as he finished the race in a time of 38.00. However, this time was .21 seconds behind champion Hayward junior Lucas Hansen, whose time of 37.79 happened to break the D2 state record of 37.82 (set in 2018 by Lodi’s Robby Hatch).
While Thiry came up just short of being the third boy in history to win four events at the same WIAA State Track meet, he managed to become the first PdC High School athlete to ever win an individual state championship in two different sports and is also the first PdC boy to win multiple individual state championships in track. He also managed to score 38 points by himself which was enough to put the Hawks in third place in D2, the best team finish at the state meet for PdC Boys Track since a third place finish in 1937. The 38 points scored also broke the program record of 21 points set in 1989.
HONORABLE MENTION (in alphabetical order)
Madden Crubel, Jr., Fennimore boys track and field
Crubel finished second in the Division 3 discus and eighth in the 4x100 relay Saturday, and third in the D3 shot put last Friday to score 14.25 points and help the Fennimore boys tie for fourth in D3 at the WIAA State Meet. Crubel threw 54’3” in Friday’s shot put competition to finish behind Marathon junior Chris Marcell (new D3 state record 61’0”) and Coleman freshman Hunter Dehart (57’2.5”). Crubel then threw 164’4” in the discus Saturday to finish behind only Marcell, who also broke the D3 state record in that event with a monster throw of 211’4” in the rain. Crubel also teamed with sophomores Reece Kelley and Jake Kretschman, and Brandon Seitz to finished eight in the 4x100 relay with a time of 43.87 seconds in Saturday’s finals. The same quartet set a new school record of 43.66 seconds in Friday’s 4x100 prelims.
Maddie Driscoll, Fr., Lancaster girls track and field
Driscoll amade quite an impression at this year’s state meet, finishing second in the D2 girls 800-meter run with a time of 2:14.98, which was considerably better than her sectional time of 2:17.66. Driscoll also teamed up with Annie Martin, Ava Green and Kylie Olmstead to finish seventh in the 4x800 (9:30.44) and with Madeline Burr, Martin and Olmstead to finish 11th in the 4x400 (4:03.28).
Peyton Hale, Sr., Lancaster boys track and field
Hale finished second in the D2 boys 200 meters (21.91), tied for sixth in the 100-meter-dash (10.96) and teamed up with Brennen gildersleeve, Max Bedward and Semaj Venson to place third in the 4x100 relay (42.22).
Issac Henkel, Sr., Fennimore boys track and field
Henkel finished second in Division 3 boys 800-meter run, fifth in the 400 and sixth in the 4x400 relay to score 12.75 teams points over the weekend at the WIAA Track and Field State Championships. ualifier, achieved an incredible feat when he finished second in the boys 800-meter run final Friday morning, while running out of the “slower” first heat. With his back against the wall and not having the advantage of running head-to-head with the 10 fastest qualifiers, Henkel had to be his own pacesetter. He dropped the hammer from the blast of the starter’s gun and posted a new school record time of 1:55.38, a time that beat all but Madison Abundant Life senior Jacob Sturm, who won the event with a time of 1:52.46. He saved enough juice to help the Fennimore boys 4x400 relay team of Kretschman, sophomore Brody Roth and senior Ben Varela qualify sixth (3:28.78) for Saturday’s finals. The next day, Henkel finished fifth in the 400 moving up four spots in final 100 meters to post another school record time 49.46 seconds. He closed out his amazing prep career later in the way when he won his third medal of this year’s state meet — and eight of his career — with a sixth-place finish in the 4x400 relay (3:28.33).
Cole Herbst, So., Platteville boys golf
Herbst made the most out of his first trip to last week’s WIAA Boys Golf State Championships. The reigning two-time Southwest Wisconsin Conference Player of the Year shot a two-day total of 158 — posting back-to-back 79s — to finish tied for 12th place in Division 2 last Monday and Tuesday at University Ridge Golf Course. Herbst also finished in a five-way tie for most birdies in the 45-player Division 2 field with seven.
